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Stop! 

A Handy Monitor and 
Pocket Conscience. 



THE NEW"COLTON'S LACON." 



By Author of NEVER and ALWAYS.' 



IRS. MARY J. HOLMES' NO? ELS 



Over a MILLION Sold 



THE NEW BOOK 



Queenie Hetherton 



JUST OUT. 



For Sale ZE^^ex' .v w Zb_e:r?e 



Price, $1.50. 




STOP! 



A Handy Monitor, Pocket Con- 
science and Portable Guard- 
ian against the World, 
the Flesh and the 
Devil. 



14 Stop ! To pause, knock off, let up, cheese it, switch off, give 
it a rest, cut short, stand like a rock, kick against, shut down, bring up 
with a round turn, hold hard," etc.— Thesaurus. 

" What would you, sir ? I pray you stop y nor yield a hair to vicious 
promptings !" — Moliere. 

By MENTOR. 

AUTHOR OF "NEVER" AND " ALW^fS.* 

17 

NEW YORK: S£*> 0****1 

COPYRIGHT, 18 

G. JV. Carle ton & Co., Publishers. 

LONDON : S. LOW & CO. 
MDCCCLXXXIV. 







N. Y. 



Introduction. 



7^ HE pining need of a work of this kind — an 
instructive sharpener in book- form, as it 
were, of the moral faculty — has long been so 
seriously felt that the author eagerly hastens to 
supply it. 

In "Never " and " Always," his appeal 
was rather to the externalities of life. In 
" Stop," his aim is to regulate the very springs 
of impulse, deliberation and resolve, hi other 



Introduction. 



A\ there is not a temptation that he would 
not strip of its disguise, not an unworthy motive 
that he would not pulverise as with a corrective 
elub, not a misleading conceit that he would 
7io t skewer to its squirming source. 

Although the pearls of thought and monitory 
gems herewith presented are intended mainly for 
young men just entering upo?i the great work of 
life, there is neither man nor maid, stripling nor 
patriarchy saphead nor sage who may not seram- 
He for them with avidity, and °/ory in their pos- 
session. 

Young man, are you hesitating in the choice 
of a vocation ? A reference to the admonitions 
under this head in "Stop" may be the means of 
your becoming a Millionaire, a Police Magistrate 






Introduction. 



or an ornament to society. Are you in love, or 
willing to be ? A consultation of the advice at 
your command may place you in such hobnobbing, 
soul-wedded relations with the rosy god as shall 
cause you to charm, to captivate, and finally to 
wrest the rapt, responsive throb from Beauty s 
battlemented heart. Are you a drive 'ling idiot 
in money matters? Inbibe, and be wise. And 
so on, through all the departments of existence. 

Thus, panoplied, as it were, against the 
World, the Flesh and the Devil, you might even- 
tually, in an agony of gratitude and wonderment, 
eulogize the author in the significant words of 
Hamlet, slightly altered, to the following effect : 

" y Sblood ! he plays on me easier than on a 
pipe / He would seem to know my Stops ; he 



Introduction, 



lid pluck out the heart of my mystery; he 

! me from my lowest notes to the top 

; there is SO mueh musie, excellent 

\nd incomparable counsel in this little 










Contents. 



In Choosing a Vocation 


9 


In General Deportment 


19 


In Love Affairs 


• 27 


In Money Matters .... 


• 39 


In Guarding Against Bad Habits . 


. 48 


In Judging Others 


55 


In Recreations .... 


. 64 


In the Domestic Relations 


• 73 


In Business Life 


. 84 


In Thought, Word and Deed 


91 



Stop ! 



In Choosing a Vocation. 

Stop, first, and reflect what you are fit 
for. To rush recklessly into an occupa- 
tion of which you are as ignorant as 
a horse is of music, is not to be thought 
of. 

Stop, next, and consider if what you have 
in view is respectable. Or, if too much 
of an ass to distinguish between bank- 
ing and bunco, for instance, read up 
carefully on horse-sense. 



(T§ In C /loosing a Vocation. 

Stop, again, and be sure that your choice 
is in keeping with your capacity. To 
ay one of the learned professions if 
wholly uneducated, speculative pur- 
suits if a natural born fool, or hod-car- 
rying if lily-handed, spindle-propped 
and wasp-waisted, is hardly a proof of 
intellectuality. 

Stop, your career being chosen, to master 
its rudiments before essaying its higher 
walks. Rome was not built in a i 
nor is any vocation a spring-board to 
waft you into the empyrean at the 
primary bounce. 

Step long enough to master the rule of 
" addition, division and silence," if seek- 
ing political preferrment, or employ- 
ment as a confidential clerk. 

Stop long enough in one vocation to give 






In Choosing a Vocation. n 

it a fair trial. Jacks-of-all-trades — men 
who are studying law in the morning, 
counter-hopping after dinner, peddling 
soap to-day, starting a bank to-morrow 
— are seldom successful. 

Stop, and ponder deeply, before becoming 
that pitiable object, a professional office- 
seeker. Rather sink your independence 
of thought and action at once by mar- 
rying for money, or toadying upon a 
rich relative. 

Stop, if a lawyer s office-boy, before intrud- 
ing your legal views upon your employ- 
er's graver consultations. Think ! 
Should you excite his professional envy 
at the outset ? 

Stop, if beginning as a dry-goods clerk, 
before imagining yourself a silent part- 
ner in the concern, with your four dol- 



12 In Choosing a Vocation* 

lars a week as its chief investment. 
Self-respect is one thing, unmitigated, 
idiotic asiniriity another. 

Stop, if at the tape-and-shoestrings coun- 
ter, before aspiring to the glittering 
generalities of the ribbons and laces, or 
the grave responsibilities of the white- 
goods department. The cares of these 
high functions may surpass your con- 
ception, and we must creep before we 
climb. 

Stop before entering the ministry, if with- 
out religious convictions, a sacrilegious 
scoffer, and morally depraved. 

Stop on the ragged edge of the fallacy 
that your place, or any man's cannot be 
filled by another. When men die, as 
they all must, are their places not always 
filled ? 



In Choosing a Vocation. 13 

Stop on the brink of blatant, unaccredited, 
irresponsible quackery in anything, but 
especially if desirous of becoming a 
disciple of Hippocrates. 

Stop, if contemplating a banking career, 
and inquire if you have a mathematical 
mind and attainments. A vague ac- 
quaintance with the rule of three, to- 
gether with a mouth-watering desire for 
colossal wealth, cannot alone enable 
you to rival the wizards of finance. 

Stop before setting up on your own ac- 
count, unless thoroughly in earnest. 
Even a peanut-stand may be dignified 
by business energy and perseverance. 

Stop short, bring up with a round turn, at 
any inducement, however dazzling, that 
is not strictly honest. You can better 
afford to be mediocre than obnoxious. 



14 In Choosing a Vocation. 

Stop, and consider well, before taking up 
a patent lightning-rod Agents are al- 
ready numerous, and fanners' dogs on 
the alert. 

Stop, before joining the army of commer- 
cial drummers, and be sure that you 
possess three qualifications in a superla- 
tive degree, ic : cheek, pertinacity and 
the gift of gab. 

Stop, should you become a drummer, at 
the nineteenth lie in support of one line 
of goods. Mendacity hath its limits, 
and even the credulity of a yokel may 
be ixorcjed. 

Stop on the giddy verge of over-estimate 
in any business. " Hope," says Lacon, 
" is a prodigal young heir, and experi- 
ence is his banker ; but his drafts are 
seldom honored, because he draws 



In Choosing a Vocation. 15 

largely on a small capital, is not yet in 
possession, and if he were, would die." 

Stop, indignantly repel, all inducements 
on the part of advertising sharks. Their 
name is legion, and they seek but to 
devour. 

Stop, howsoever tempted, at the allure- 
ments of roguery, embezzlement, ras- 
cality, and satanic suggestions of every 
description. If you must be a cutpurse 
let it be on the broad highway, pistol 
in hand, dime-novel at heart, and the 
gallows in sight. 

Stop, if contemplating a political career, 
and distinctly settle this question in 
your mind : Am I to boss the party, or 
is the party to boss me ? There is 
nothing like avoiding a confusion of 
ideas. 



16 In Choosing a Vocation. 

Stop, next, and be certain that your am- 
bition is not o'erleaping its aim. Pluck 
bright honor from the pale-faced moon, 
if possible, but to make a dead set for 
the Presidency and bring up as a police- 
court janitor, or coroner's assistant, is 
apt to prove discouraging. 

Stop, even if rich, before entering upon 
pleasure as a business. Pew constitu- 
tions can long stand the racket, ennui 
is the result, and premature death its 
bourne. 

Stop before entering the literary profes- 
sion, if devoid of imagination, a prov- 
erbial fool, and with but a lazy compre- 
hension of orthography, grammar and 
syntax. 

Stop, next, and ask yourself, what great 
author, dead or living, shall I emulate ? 



In Choosing a Vocation. 17 

Then, be your model Shakespeare or 
Bartley Campbell, Thackeray or Tup- 
per, Byron or the Burlington Hawkeye, 
stick to your ideal, revel in ink and 
starve for glory. 

Stop, if of a dramatic turn, before abso- 
lutely forcing a manager to produce 
your play. There are, unfortunately, 
legal safeguards for even this species of 
credulous, unsophisticated, profession- 
als. 

Stop, and reflect profoundly, before 
adopting pugilism as a vocation, if con- 
stitutionally weak in the back, color- 
blind, short-winded, and timid to pus- 
illanimity. 

Stop before deciding upon a histrionic 
career, until satisfied that you are not 



i8 



In Choosing a Vocation* 



better fitted for an auction-room or a 
junk-shop. 
Stop, in any calling, long enough to be- 
come familiar with the foot of the lad- 
der before clawing ineffectually at the 
top-round. Beginning at the top, to 
come down with a rush, is reserved for 
millionaires' sons, holders of winning 
lottery-tickets and cat's-paws of nomi- 
nating conventions. 




In General Deportment. 

Stop at the assumption of a supercilious, 
ducal air, especially if small of stature, 
monkey-brained and impecunious. This 
is solely the privilege of floor-walkers, 
brained midgets and actresses' husbands. 

Stop, on the other hand, if tall and com- 
manding, before cultivating a creeping, 
crushed demeanor, unless you are a col- 
porteur or dog-stealer. 

Stop on the brink of wholly disregarding 
the prevailing fashions. Knee-breeches, 
shoe-buckles, a powdered wig, and a 
swallow-tailed coat, with the waist-but- 
tons between the shoulder-blades, would 



2o In General Department. 

stamp you as an eccentric at the pres- 
ent day. 

Stop before despising the requirements of 
the seasons. A straw-hat in a snow- 
storm, for instance, would excite re- 
mark. 

Stop when vanity counsels an excess of 
ornament. To exhibit a jewel or two 
with judgment is one thing, to groan 
under a clanking avoirdupois of gauds 
and trinkets another. 

Stop at the claims of both a cadaverous 
gravity and a causeless facctiousness of 
demeanor. Neither the belfry owl nor 
the proverbial basket of chips should be 
you model in this regard. 

Stop on the verge of unnecessary violence 
in word and deed. Resent, if you must, 
without preliminary roaring. The dead- 






In General Deportment. 21 

ly submarine torpedo is terrible in its 
explosion, but less noisy than the harm- 
less bursting of an inflated paper-bag. 

Stop before criticising what you do not 
understand. The bore indulging in 
this species of idiocy is deserving of an 
enforced association with numerous 
mothers-in-law in a whisper-gallery. 

Stop, indeed, snap your jaws to like a 
spring-trap, at the very suggestion of 
an oath or low expression. " Profani- 
ty," says Lacon, " never yet dignified 
wrath nor emphasized a great purpose." 

Stop before indulging in covert sneers. 
Indeed, " a good, mouth-filling oath " is 
preferable, because less hypocritical, 
but an ungarnished assertion is better 
than either. 

Stop before meanly insinuating what 



2 2 /;/ General Deportment* 

should be plainly spoken. Kven if a 
man owes you money, which you think 
he ought to pay, tell him so, or ask for 
an explanation, instead of conveying 
your meaning through an allusion to 
his current expense or new clothes. 
This is the course of a sneak and a 
coward. 

Stop, rather, and bewail the abolition of 
imprisonment for debt, or tell him that 
he ought to live cheaply and go in rags 
until he liquidates. 

Stop before assuming a rasping, file-edged, 
v/hip-in-hand demeanor toward your de- 
pendents or inferiors. Apart from its 
villainously bad taste, the whirligig of 
time may bring about a transposition of 
relations, and then where are you ? 

Stop, on the other hand, ere adopting a 



In General Deportment. 23 

groveling, sycophantic, ultra-ingratiat- 
ing manner with your superiors. " The 
flavor that can only be won by fawning 
servility is seldom of great worth." 

Stop before persisting in a style of laugh 
that can betray your motives to your 
disadvantage. The " He, he, he !" of 
hypocrisy is as patent as the " Haw, 
haw, haw I" of the windbag. 

Stop at an unwarranted ostentation of 
speech and bearing. The dung-hill 
bird is distinguished quite as much by 
his strut as by his vociferousness. 

Stop, in addressing a woman, and consider 
the privilege of her sex, even if she may 
have aggrieved you. 

Stop, on the other hand, before over- 
whelming her with an excess of courtesy. 



/;/ General Deportment. 



Over-attentiveness to women always in- 
spires a suspicion as to its motive. 
Stop before retailing a scandal, even if 

convinced of its truth. This is the pro- 
vince of the incorrigible gossip and the 
newspaper reporter, with neither of 
whom you can hope to cope. 

Stop on the threshold of a temptation to 
distort the truth. * Plausibility in lying 
is an art in which but few can earn dis- 
tinction. 

Stop before disputing a fact, however dis- 
tasteful, that can be proved by statisti- 
cal evidence. Figures are not apt to 
lie, save on gas-metres. 

Stop before adhering to an error through 
a mistaken sense of shame. " Who ac- 
knowledged his error showeth an In- 
crease of wisdom ; who stubbornly ad- 



In General Deportment. 25 

hereth to what hath been disproved con- 
fesseth himself a fool." 

Stop short of the conceit that irresistibil- 
ity with the fair sex depends on good- 
looks alone. The manners make the 
man. 

Stop before aping the characteristics of an- 
other, however exalted. The gesticula- 
tions of the Frenchman would be un- 
seemly in the staid Hidalgo, and that 
which would be a pleasing originality 
in one might be a preposterous parody 
in the imitator. 

Stop short of the notion that wiseacre 
looks and frigidity of manner will always 
be indicative of reserved force and in- 
tellectual acumen. The owl is the 
solemnest and likewise the stupidest of 
birds. 



26 In General Deportment. 

Stop, whenever in moral doubt or distress, 
and consult the masterly advice and 
sage promptings of this jewel of a book. 
It shall be unto you "as rivers of water 
in a dry place, or the shadow of a great 
rock in a weary land." 




In Love Affairs. 

Stop !■ — That burning thought — that de- 
lirium in thy heart — as to the lovely- 
being whose image is before thee night 
and day — is it such as her modesty and 
virtue, her seraphic guilelessness should 
inspire ? if not, away with it — blot it 
out ! 

Stop ! Was she rather plain than peer- 
less, and is it the thought of her father's 
bonds and shekels that now summons 
the enamored hectic to thy virile cheek ? 
Away with it, likewise, and for shame ! 
Shall blood with boodle blend — emotion 
cringe at Mammon's beck — and Love 
be unavenged ? 



28 In Love Affairs. 

Stop ! Stay yet again thy headlong 
plungl Was she yet lovely, an houri 
of a dream, but still beneath thee in 
family, station, fortune, and didst there- 
fore smile but to deceive ? If so, hold 
hard, hug this sweet volume to thy 
heart of hearts, and sin no more! 

Stop, and meditate upon the three fore- 
going paragraphs, for in them are em- 
bodied the cardinal principles in making 
love : Purity of purpose, Disinterest- 
edness and Truth. 

Stop for some encouragement before 
rendering your attentions universally 
conspicuous. A glance of the eye, a 
tremor of the lip, the merest shadow of 
a blush upon the seashell-tinted cheek, 
will suffice. 

Stop, if such subtle signs are wanting or 






In Love Affairs. 29 

withheld, and plan some deep-laid 
scheme to unveil heart's predilection, 
indifference, or dislike. Oysters and 
ice-cream are still available in their re- 
spective seasons. 

Stop before mistaking* a passing fancy for 
a wild, consuming maddening, over- 
mastering, star-jostling passion. This 
mistake has evoked more paternal 
walking-sticks and breach-of-promise 
suits than would keep a French novelist 
in subject-matter for a twelvemonth. 

Stop, after falling head over ears in love, 
to collect your senses and formulate 
your plans. An inconsiderate, mani- 
acal rush into a declaration is often re- 
pented at leisure. 

Stop, if not certain of your ground, be- 
fore wholly unmasking your batteries. 







o In Love Affairs* 



Delicate attentions, even worshiping, 

awe-struck glances from afar, are time- 
old preliminaries, but none the less 
effective. 
Stop, however, on the threshold of fever- 
ish demonstration at the outset. Fur- 
nace-like sighs, dazed, dumb-founded 
looks, like those of an expiring calf, and 
frenzied bodily contortions may be i 
brought to bear in their own crood 

o o 

time. 

Stop short of opposing her tastes and con- 
victions. To gently chime with them, 
whether you have any of your own or 
not, while preserving a vigorous mascu- 
linity in favor of quail-gorging, head- 
punching and kindred noble sports, is 
in the main commendable. 

Stop before vaunting a wild, atheistical 



In Love Affairs. 31 

or Ingersollian contempt for all things 
sacred, if she should be of a deeply re- 
ligious turn. However, this is not to 
prescribe a regular biblical course, a 
very little of which goes a great way in 
the wooing o't. 

Stop before disclaiming all love for music, 
or suggesting the banjo or bagpipe as 
your favorite instrument, should she 
dote on the opera, sing divinely and be 
a piano -pounder of no mean ability in 
her own person. 

Stop before depreciating anything the 
dear creature does, or tries to do. 
Eagerly demand another song, even if 
the screech of her first has ruined your 
tympanum, call her verses divine, if 
they are no better than Tennyson's 
latest senility, swear that her favorite 



32 /;/ Love Affairs* 

scent is yours, even if 'tis musk or gar- 
lic, and build, build as with a wand, the 
shining edifice of love ! 

Stop right off at the idea that there may 
be anything hypocritical or insincere 
advised in the foregoing paragraph. 
If really in love, you will religiously 
believe everything you tell her, and more 
too. 

Stop, first, however, and study the char- 
acter of your enchantress. All women 
are no more to be wooed alike than 
are all fish to be tempted with the same 
kind of bait. 

Stop before addressing a brainy, well-read 
penetrative divinity as you would a 
laughing elf, a careless, careless fay, a 
butterfly of mirth and joy. An Hypa- 
tia is not a Hebe, and reflect ! Would 



In Love Affairs. 33 

you tempt an eagle with a. moth-light, 
or a striped-bass with an eel-bob ? 

Stop, if she be intellectual, and study up 
to an equality with her tastes, should 
you be her inferior. Then scientific 
discussions, with poetry as a side-dish, 
may gradually lead up to the delicious 
desideratum of two hearts that beat as 
one. 

Stop, however, at the error of preferring 
her intellectual to her physical charms. 
She is a lovely liar if she pretends to a 
desire for such preference, and your sin 
will be unpardonable, should you take 
her at her word. 

Stop, in any case, before praising another 
woman's good-looks in the adored one's 
presence. In fact, you can afford her 1 ' 
no pleasanter flattery than by a sys- 



34 J* Love Affairs. 

tematic depreciation of a prettier wo- 
man's charms. 

Stop, if she be a Hebe, we will say, and 
plunge recklessly amid her paucity of 
ideas. Flounder in folly, palpitate with 
persiflage, at her giggling beck ; and 
here is ample opportunity for the silent 
eloquence of the nosegay, the oyster, or 
the iced refreshment, not less than for 
the princely prodigality of the opera, 
the midnight coupe and the church fair 
lottery. 

Stop short of any display of fear in her 
presence, even if you are tinorous to 
the core. Let her do the shrieking at 
the onset of a mouse, but stand you as 
the rugged rock, the beaten anvil, or 
the rooted oak ! You might even tram- 
ple out a croton-bug occasionally, with 



In Love Affairs. 35 

a cold, feelingless laugh. Imperturba- 
bility in peril was never yet a masculine 
fault in gentle woman's eyes. 

Stop before incurring the dislike of the 
fair one's little brothers or sisters. The 
malapert maliciousness of r enfant terri- 
ble may occasion mortifications without 
number. 

Stop before losing your temper with a 
rival in your charmers presence. If 
you must come to blows, let it be in a 
retired spot, but it were far better to 
sit him out, beat him on bouquets, gum 
drops and theatre-tickets, or otherwise 
defeat him in the rosy lists. 

Stop at the one thousandth kiss, after 
receiving the coveted "Yes " from the 
adored one's lips. Byron, it is true, in 

i one of his callow effusions, counsels a 



3 6 /;/ Love Affairs. 

million, but, as a conscientious Mentor, 
We prefer to draw the line somewhere 
even in such an emotional proceeding. 

Stop, discontinue the siege altogether, in 
case of a downright rejection, howso- 
ever reluctant, howsoever tearful. 
Don't put up with the sisterly substi- 
tute, either ; but just float out grandly 
on the ebb-tide of broken hopes, until 
brighter eyes a welcome shine to solace 
and to cheer. 

Stop before imagining, if accepted, that 
your ordeal is now nearly at an end. 
Why, gentle sir, it hath just begun. 
You are now owned. 

Stop short at the idea that even your 
former devotion is still in order. If it 
was a bouquet or two per week before, 
it is now a cart-load per day ; your male 






In Love Affairs. 37 

familiars must sigh for you in vain— 
your off-nights are things of the past ; 
you are on exhibition, not only to your 
fiancees family, but to the world at 
large ; you are an engaged man ! 

Stop on the verge of suicidal despair as a 
result of your first lovers' quarrel. This 
is but the pepper-sauce of passion, the 
curry of courtship, the horse-radish of 
happiness, without which that crowning 
reflection, the kiss-gilt, teardrop-rain- 
bowed making-up were banished forever 
from Love's golden feast ! 

Stop, in a general way, before making 
love for the fun of the thing. There is 
no meaner, more reptilian creature in 
society than the professional male 
flirt. 

Stop before yielding an iota to the allure- 



38 /;/ Love Affairs. 

ments of a notorious coquette. Heart- 
lessness is her dower, emotional misery 
her delight, falseness her stock in trade, 
and the ashen Dead Sea fruit the only 
reward in her power, even if she love at 
last. 

Stop before permitting your admiration of 
an actress, or ballet dancer, to glide 
into a master passion. Disenchantment, 
if desired, is mostly within easy reach, 
and you can console yourself with the 
reflection that there is far more beauty 
off the stage than on it. 

Stop short of making love at all, if you 
are not of an affectionate disposition ; 
or, when too late — that is, when mar- 
ried, love will be likely to stop short of 
you. 






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In Money Matters. 

Stop, first, and understand the value of 
money — the importance of never being 
without some money, even if a very 
little. 

Stop, next, and understand that money is 
nothing in itself alone, but valuable and 
powerful only in what it will purchase 
and can purchase. A pure love of it 
for itself, and not for what it represents, 
develops a loathsome disease — the dis- 
ease of miserliness. 

Stop short of envying the rich, even if 
penniless yourself. A philosophical 
reflection as to the causes of your bad 



jo In Money Matters. 

fortune, together with a resolve to mend 
it by a more enlightened course, is your 
only remedy. 

Stop, however, yet shorter of the vulgar, 
pigheaded notion that money, even by 
the ton-weight, can be everything with- 
out moral or intellectual backing. If 
this were so, wealth would be more 
glorious than wisdom, which happily, it 
is not. 

Stop before parting with money, even to 
an insignificant amount, without some 
sort of equivalent. This rule need not 
render you either parsimonious or 
uncharitable, since even alms-giving 
brings a return in the consciousness of 
having yielded to a kindly impulse. 

Stop before cultivating a hoarding spirit, 
and remember that, logically, as between 



In Money Matters. 41 

the miser and the spendthrift, the latter 
has the best of the bargain. For, while 
the spendthrift has the selfish satisfac- 
tion of squandering his fortune in his 
own person, the miser is the dupe of 
his own self-denial, for the benefit of 
others who come after him. 

Stop, however, before emulating the 
spendthrift any more than the miser. 
If there is never any love for the 
scheming parsimony of the one, neither 
is there ever any gratitude for the 
thoughtless largess of the other. 

Stop, and reflect well, before borrowing 
money under any circumstances. To 
an honest man, indebtedness is ever a 
double torture — self-torture in the 
haunting possibility of not being able 
to keep his word, and the torture of 



42 In Money Matters. 

imagining what, in that case, will be 
thought of him. 

Stop, dead, before borrowing money that 
you are not sure of being able to repay. 
As for the man who borrows without 
the intention to repay, he is even worse 
than a professional thief, and as fully 
deserving of social ostracism. 

Stop before becoming that unmitigated 
bore, a chronic borrower. He is at best 
a pitiful creature, shunned even when 
commiserated, and the strongest ties of 
friendship cannot long withstand the 
wrench of his proximity. 

Stop, even before lending money to a 
friend, and reflect that non-liquidation 
must cost you your money, and may 
cost you — your friend. 

Stop, however, if you mean to grant a 



In Money Matters. 43 

request for a loan, and grant it freely. 
To produce it as if extracting a wisdom- 
tooth, or accompany it with a stereo- 
typed moral lecture on the hardness of 
the times, etc., is much like placing his 
request on a level with mendicancy. 

Stop short — indeed, as abruptly as you 
please — of lending money to a known 
profligate or spendthrift. The pro- 
verbial blood from a turnip may be 
sooner expected than genuine thankful- 
ness for an accommodation from such a 
source, and the probability is that he 
will secretly laugh at you for a fool. 

Stop, however, and reflect well before 
adopting a general and irrevocable rule 
of never lending money under any cir- 
cumstances. Many eminent men, the 
reverse of hard-hearted, have conscien- 



4 i- In Money Matters. 

tiously adopted this rule, but whether 
it is the best, as the world goes, is a 
question. 

Stop before compromising with such a 
rule by offering as a gift that which is 
entreated as a loan. This is the course 
usually pursued by the eminent men 
alluded to above ; but such a proffer is 
always humiliating, and often insulting. 

Stop before running in debt, even for 
groceries or beer, for that for which you 
can pay on the spot. It is a pernicious 
habit that must steadily engender looser 
and looser notions about money matters. 

Stop before adopting honesty as your 
standard merely on the immorally aph- 
oristic grounds of its being the best 
policy. True integrity should stand on 
its merits, win or lose ; whereas any 



In Money Matters. 45 

shrewd rascal would be honest on occa- 
sion, if satisfied that he would make by 
it. 

Stop, rather, and fortify your uprightness 
on the broad grounds, " that honesty is 
not only the deepest policy, but the highest 
wisdom; since however difficult it may 
be for integrity to get on, it is a thou- 
sand times more difficult for knavery to 

^ get off." 

Stop before cultivating an inordinate de- 
sire to get rich in haste. In ninety-nine 
cases out of a hundred it will develop 
into a species of frenzy that must over- 
reach and defeat its aims. 

Stop, rather, and understand that in specu- 
lation, the prizes of the few r are only 
rendered possible by the ruin of the 
many. 



46 In Money Matters* 

Slop before setting up financial comets — 
that is suddenly-rich men — as your ex- 
emplars. The exceptional boldness, 
or uncrupulousncss which constituted 
their open sesame to dazzling fortune, 
may but fling wide, for the mediocre 
imitator, the doors of poverty or of the 
state prison. 

Stop when you have achieved a comfort- 
able competence, and devote yourself 
to the rational enjoyment thereof. To 
be stacking up dollars and securities to 
the last gasp is worse than making a 
hell on earth ; since it is a perversity so 
obtuse as to imagine that as heaven 
which is in truth a hell. 

Stop, and remember, that the accumula- 
tion of wealth, as a sole pursuit, is a 
diseased passion, just as much as is the 



In Money Matters. 47 

craving for strong drink, or for the ex- 
citement of gambling, 
Stop, therefore, in the headlong race for 
money, and so intersperse that pursuit 
with knowledge and unselfish deeds, 
with moral and intellectual recreations, 
as shall render it the chief means, rather 
than the chief end, of a useful existence. 




In Guarding Against Bad 
Habits. 



Sror before cultivating an inordinate self- 
conceit, and remember that real worth is 
mostly modest, while those persons are 
the vainest who have the least to be 
vain of. 

Stop before contracting a habit of exag- 
geration. This is the stock-in-trade 
of the cheap penny-a-liner, while the 
strength of the true historian lies in 
conscientious statement. 

Stop short of fancying that such exaggera- 
tion can impress others with your im- 



In Guarding against Bad Habits. 49 

aginative powers. Were this true, the 
grimaces of a baboon might be ascribed 
to emotional fine frenzy. 

Stop before contracting the habit of ly- 
ing, even in a harmless way. But this 
fault is as naturally the outgrowth of 
extravagance or looseness of statement, 
as is the noxious weed of the miscel- 
laneous muck that stimulates it into 
useless being. 

Stop short of listlessness in word, look 
and deed. A perfunctory person is 
never in demand, and Rip Van Winkle 
only indemnified society in sleeping out 
his twenty years. 

Stop, and do nothing, rather than pro- 
crastinate indefinitely. Untrustworthi- 
ness is the final result of procrastina- 
tion, and a reputation for that is tanta- 



50 In Guarding against Bad Habits. 

mount to elimination from the world's 
employment. 

Stop far short of any indulgence that can 
affect your general reputation. u The 
two most precious things this side the 
grave," szys Z*acon, "are our reputation 
and our life ; the most contemptible 
whisper may deprive us of the one, the 
weakest weapon of the other. 

Stop the use of tobacco, if addicted to it, 
but especially in the form of chewing, 
the vileness of this practice is in no wise 
mitigated by its prevalence. 

Stop smoking, also, at its first threatened 
inroad upon the general health. To 
persist in it thereafter is a confession of 
both moral and mental weakness. 

Stop on the threshold of gambling of 
every description, and, if already in the 



In Guarding against Bad Habits. 51 

toils, shut down on the practice with all 
the ponderosity at your command. 

Stop, moreover, and understand that 
gambling — the worship of chance — is 
death to the soul, to faith in human 
nature, to man's nobler attributes. In 
this regard, it is more literally demor- 
alizing than alcoholic drunkenness ; and 
there is yet to be found the veteran 
professional gambler who is not a ma- 
terialistic atheist. 

Stop, once more, and remember that every 
man who will play cards for money, will 
in time, cheat. He may set out honestly 
enough, but it is only a question of time 
before he will take an unfair advantage 
in self-defense. What, then, can be 
thought of a practice that almost neces- 
sitates dishonesty ? 



5 2 In Guarding against Bad Habits. 

Stop— hoi J ! That " D— n V upon thy 
lips! Would not "Confound it!" "The 
deuce take it !" or simply " Bless me !" 
emphasize resentment or annoyance 
equally well ? Or, still better, is there 
any need for emphasis at all ? 

Stop, above all, before falling* into the 
profane habit, upon no provocation. A 
passionless, half-conscious interlarding 
of speech with oaths and epithets is as 
idiotic as it is disgusting. 

Stop on the verge of becoming anecdotal 
to excess. Second only to the con- 
firmed scandal-bearer is the friend whose 
encounter one must dodge for fear of 
being made the repository of some long- 
winded anecdote, or pointless pun. 

Stop short of narrating indecent stories. 
Unfortunately, nearly all storiesof much 



In Guarding against Bad Habits. 53 

point that are interchanged among men 
are of this description ; ergo, eschew the 
retailing of them, on your own part, 
altogether. 

Stop before becoming the slave of any de- 
praved appetite. To take the appetite 
for strong drink as an illustration, it 
is a terrible enchantress — siren, bac- 
chante, or task-mistress, at will. One 
can seldom coquette with but he marries 
her at last ; when, like the Lamia of 
the legend, she turns to a serpent in the 
embrace, and her dalliance is despair 
and death. 

Stop before contracting a habit of belit- 
tling or sneering at what you do not 
understand. This is but the pasteboard 
buckler with which the fool would shield 
his self-love. 



54 /* Guarding against Bad Habits. 

Stop before habitually ascribing mean or 
sordid motives to others upon mere 
conjecture. 

Stop short of any habit that can fruitlessly 
waste one's time or substance, since the 
one is more than money, because, once 
dissipated, it can never be replaced, and 
the other is the very means of life. 





In Judging Others. 

Stop before gauging a person's capacity 
solely by his physiognomy. Lafayette's 
forehead suggested idiocy, Keats, the 
poet, had the jaws of a prize-fighter, 
and warriors of the Salvation Army 
have been mistaken (before opening 
their mouths) for men of intelligence. 

Stop, however, before judging people al- 
together on antithetic grounds. To 
invariably accept a monkey-jawed, rat- 
eyed, ear-shadowed countenance as a 
criterion for mental profundity, for 
instance, or crime-sodden, sin-exhaling 



D 



o /;/ Judging Others. 



bulldog traits as suggestive of ethical 
culture or religious zeal, is hardly to be 
recommended. 

Stop before judging others, especially 
men, wholly by their dress and manners. 
A millionaire may be " shabby-genteel 
and retiring to excess, whereas profes- 
sional scoundrels are often notorious 
for a fashionable exterior and distinc- 
tion of bearing "as to the manner 
born." 

Stop on the verge of taking dress and 
ornament as a sure indication of a 
woman's character or station. You 
might regret mistaking a quietly-attired 
unadorned heiress for a shirt-maker in 
distress ; or a fourth-class pawnbroker's 
wife, beringed and bediamonded from 
bancr to belt, for a sorceress of fashion. 






In Judging Others. 5 7 

Stop before judging people disparagingly 
by their eccentricities. A poet, for 
instance, may indulge in long hair, with- 
out necessarily being an czsthete or a 
cowboy ; the habit of talking to one's- 
self is no proof of a guilty conscience ; 
and absent-mindedness in many forms 
has accompanied the possession of 
exceptional capacity. 

Stop, however, before accepting such 
betrayals as positive indications of 
either genius, talent or brains. To do 
this would be to libel the ordinarily 
well-behaved people who have some 
respect for the amenities of existence. 

Stop, for instance, ere ascribing pure 
benevolence to the absent-mindedness 
that mistakes your silk umbrella for a 
mislaid gingham one, shaky in the 



58 /;/ Jnd i 

ribs, feruled with long' service, and fil- 
tery at the seams. 
Stop and draw a line likewise, at the ab- 
straction that finds its hand in your 
pocket, or creeps in at your bedroom 
window, or is blandly oblivious as to 
whether it owes you money, or 

Stop, and turn the question over in your 
mind : True enough, there is a chance 
of such eccentricities beinor the concom- 
itants of a certain sort of talent, but is 
it exactly the sort that ought to be 
encouraged ? 

Stop, if naturally dishonest or vicious 
yourself, and inquire if ycru can fairly 
judge others according to your own cor- 
rupt standard. This may prevent your 
giving yourself away, besides leavening 



In Judging Others. 59 

your collective baseness with a grain 
or two of charity. 

Stop, however, if honest and well-meaning 
— and, indeed, it is mainly for such that 
this symposium of golden precepts is 
prepared — and remember, as a stimu- 
lant to careful discrimination in these 
things, that your own superficialities 
may be constantly and cruelly mis- 
judged. 

Stop short of supposing that you have no 
superficialities, or but few, to be judged 
by. The visibility of existence is 
largely made up of them ; it is, perhaps 
even well that the heart is not often 
worn upon the sleeve ; and equally well 
that our externals are but deceptive in- 
dices of the springs of action, the blots 



Go fn Judging Others* 

and foibles they disguise, else were the 
wisest of us each other's sport. 

Stop before taking mildness and retire- 
ment of manner for a want of resolution 
or courage. True greatness in anything 
is seldom self-celebrating, and it is as 
true as proverbial that " still waters 
run deep." 

Stop, on the other hand, before setting 
down a strutting self-importance as in- 
variably betokening a wind-bag or a 
nincompoop. Modesty is, unfortunately, 
not always the hand-maid of merit. 

Stop before mistaking ostentation for 
generosity, or calm acceptance for in- 
gratitude. " As the mean have a calcu- 
lating avarice that sometimes inclines 
them to give, so the magnanimous have 



In Judging Others. 6 1 

a condescending generosity that some- 
times inclines them to receive/' 

Stop before despising in another the dem- 
onstrativeness that you would despise 
in yourself. The babble of the brook 
is as natural as the stillness of the pool 
and temperamental differences are al- 
ways to be considered. 

Stop before regarding extreme particular- 
ity in dress as an invariable evidence of 
intellectual insignificance. It often is 
so, but nine-tenths of the shabbily- 
attired men of brains would dress bet- 
ter if they could afford to. 

Stop on the dizzy verge of mistaking an 
excessive and painstaking courtesy for 
a genuine and heartfelt interest. It 
should rather put you on your guard. 

Stop short of the old-time cynicism of re- 



52 In Judging Others. 

garding every man as a rascal until he 
shall have afforded proofs to the con- 
trary. Such a wholesale distrust of hu- 
man nature is creditable to neither the 
head nor the heart. 

Stop before sweepingly condemning a dis- 
creditable action the temptations to 
which are outside your own experience. 
Even to " put yourself in his place " is 
not always available for the formation 
of intellgent criticism in such cases. 

Stop before lightly assigning reasons for 
another's domestic troubles. The closet- 
skeleton is a strictly local spectre that 
is not the less terrible by reason of the 
narrowmess of its haunting powers. 

Stop short of disparaging the charity that 
methodizes and calculates its smallest 
alms. There is an enlightened self-in- 



£> 



In Judging Others. 63 

terest that relieves more real distress 
than all the off-handed gratuities that 
are bestowed. 

Stop before impugning self-seeking mo- 
tives to a good deed that redounds to 
the doers advantage. Even if partly 
premeditated to this end, the result, if 
humanitarian in its general influence, is 
not the less useful and noble. 

Stop before judging a man solely by his 
errors or misfortunes. The former may 
have been circumstantially unavoidable, 
as the latter may have been undeserved. 

Stop before adopting the stereotyped, 
canting " I-might-have-told-you-so" criti- 
cism in the case of a friend who has 
fallen. The helping hand is then in 
order, if ever at all ; and he is doubt- 
less aware of the cause of his disgrace, 
without your telling him. 



In Recreation. 

Stop before making a regular business of 
any form of diversion, which then ceases 
to be either recreative or relaxing, and 
but adds to the tissue-waste that should 
be restored. 

Stop, next, and consider that recreation, 
in its literal and best sense, is some- 
thing more than relaxation. More than 
to merely loosen, slacken and remit, to 
recreate is to revive, reanimate, recu- 
perate and build up afresh. 

Stop, therefore, before playing billiards or 
pool every night for five or six hours 
at a stretch, under the mistaken notion 



In Recreation. 65 

that you are combining recreation with 
amusement. 

Stop, rather, and consider if the nervous 
tension produced by an unremitting 
desire to win, and thus saddle your ad- 
versary with the cost of the game, may 
not be greater than the wear and tear 
of the routine business from which you 
-are seeking relief. 

Stop short of the error that billiards in 
public is a wholly innocent diversion, 
when candid reflection must convince 
you to the contrary. The associations 
are mostly the reverse of refined, the 
gambling principle is necessarily in- 
volved, and say what you will, non-suc- 
cess is ever attended by a sense of ex- 
asperation. 

Stop wondering why you don't feel fresh- 



66 In Recreation. 

ened up for business after a ten hours' 
siege of whisky-poker, uninterrupted 
cigars, and consequent loss of sleep. 

Stop before fancying chess-playing as any 
sort of relaxation whatever from mental 
exertion. The game, being a constant 
mental exercise, in itself should form a 
diversion from physical, rather than 
from intellectual, over-work. 

Stop short of daily conviviality after busi- 
ness hours. The idea that regular rum 
or beer-guzzling, even with the merriest 
of companions, can be sooner or latter 
anything but injurious is either hypo- 
critical or ridiculous. 

Stop, likewise, short of spreeing as a re- 
lief from business cares. Indeed, as be- 
tween the hebdomadal hurrah and the 
diurnal hoist, the distinction is so 



In Recreation. 67 

thoroughly relative to the confessedly 
evil effects in both cases as not to be 
worthy of consideration. 

Stop before seeking recreation in low re- 
sorts. Give them all a wide berth — 
concert-saloons, dives, dens, hells, 
houses of ill-repute, bucket-shops, slums, 
cribs, joints — all ! and remember that 
what is essentially debasing can ever 
reanimate exhaustion or repair fatigue. 

Stop before patronizing a low perform- 
ance of any description. Dog-fights, 
rat-baitings, cocking-mains, et al. y are 
happily surreptitious now, but there are 
equally immoral exhibitious still in 
vogue to tempt the thoughtless and 
unwary. 

Stop before seeking recreation in sen- 
suous performances or spectacles. True, 



68 In Recreation. 



the ballet is often fascinating, but — 
Well, let the line be drawn sharply just 
after the ballet, at all events. 

Stop before attempting either skating, 
bicycling, or horse-back exercise in pub- 
lic, as a gentle and graceful relaxation, 
when wholly inexperienced, if you would 
both corruscate and career. 

Stop before making a specialty of any 
kind of recreation that is beyond your 
means. Otherwise, you may not in- 
frequently exclaim, with Hamlet, u For 
O, for O, the hobby-horse is forgot ! " 

Stop at the yawning abyss of resorting to 
opium, or any similar drug, as a relief 
from care. As the alcoholic habit has 
been likened to an enchantress, a cir- 
cean witch, so the opium habit is a 
dream-woman, the sorceress of a phan- 



In Recreation. 69 

torn realm, elysian at first, but changing 
at last into a horror-haunted sphere that 
appals the spirit while it tortures and 
consumes the frame. 

Stop before applying yourself to excessive 
gymnastics as a relaxation, if a horse- 
car conductor or a letter-carrier. Vari- 
ety is the spice of life. 

Stop, if engaged in wholly intellectual 
pursuits, before reading dry and statis- 
tical books, such as Patent Reports, as 
a pleasing and hilarious change. 

Stop before joining a club with whose 
objects you are unfamiliar. To find 
yourself unawares, for instance, in the 
bosom of a hoodlum coterie when in 
search of Christian refinement, or unex- 
pectedly affiliated with a Bible society 
when thirsting for roaring and convivial 



/;/ Recreation. 



companionship, would be alike uncon- 
genial. 

Stop before seeking recreation in travel, 
if without money. True, commercial 
drummers and tramps have attained 
some success in this field, but neither 
the talents of the one class nor the 
methods of the other are to be cordially 
recommended. 

Stop before indulging in the rougher 
athletic sports for which you are physic- 
ally unqualified. Study your capacities 
well — take in the entire athletic range, 
from jackstraws to Indian clubs, from 
the bean-bag to foot-ball — and dis- 
criminate for all you are worth. 

Stop before instituting any home-amuse- 
ment that shall bind you to the house 
of evenings forever thereafter. You 



In Recreation. 7 1 

might really want to go out and " see a 
man," but the excuse would avail you 
little with the charming home-game 
awaiting your patronage. 

Stop before frequenting any lounging 
place, be it beer-saloon or cigar-shop, so 
much as to become a figure-head of the 
premises. Not to loaf at all is an ex- 
cellent general rule. 

Stop before attempting recreation " on the 
road" in an ultra-economical way. A 
livery-stable plug, hobbling ambitiously 
before a battered sleigh or antediluvian 
buggy, in the midst of swell turn-outs 
and speeding teams, would doubtless 
cause something of a sensation, but 
would it be of the most enviable kind ? 

Stop short of seeking mental repose by 
attending "excursions" in which bibu- 



7 2 In Recreation. 



lous feats and glee-club improvisations 
bid fair to make up the chief fund of 

amusement. 

Stop short of practical jokes as a relief 
for the work-oppressed brain. As be- 
tween ]6ker and ]okce, the entertain- 
ment is mostly altogether with the 
former, and one-sided or top-heavy 
diversions are both selfish and untimely. 

Stop, and be sure that you have a work- 
oppressed brain, before rushing wildly 
into any recreation whatever. The 
former is often imaginary, or a hypo- 
critical excuse for demanding a pastime, 
which is then, as a consequence, apt to 
prove much harder work than play. 




In The Domestic Relations. 

Stop short of thinking that marriage and 
settlement in life can acquit you of the 
tenderness and reverence due your par- 
ents, even if they are well-to-do. It is 
a moral obligation which, contracted at 
your birth, should cease not even with 
their death, but live on and on, an 
evergreen of the memory, an amaranth 
of the heart. 

Stop before reserving for the bosom of 
your own family the fits of ill-temper 
that you would be ashamed of it pub- 
lic. This is putting your own house- 



74 In tlic Domestic Relations 

hold on a level with a private bear-gar- 
den, whose limited spectators cannot be 
over-grateful for the privilege accorded. 

Stop short of supposing that your wife 
is anything less than an equal partner 
in the hymeneal firm. Even if she came 
to you penniless, the idea that she is 
thenceforth indebted to you for home, 
position or freedom from care, is a 
barbarism fortunately obsolete in this 
country. 

Stop, likewise, short of the imported 
notion, also obsolete, that she belongs to 
you other than by the free heart-gift 
that inspired her marriage vows, or that 
she is in any sense your property. The 
cherishing of such a sentiment is de- 
grading alike to husband and wife. 

Stop before denying to your wife the 



In the Domestic Relations. 75 

right to have little secrets of her own, 
if you claim the same privilege for your- 
self. A loving and trusted wife will 
have no important secrets apart from 
her husband. 

Stop short of altogether distrusting her in 
money matters. Even if she have but 
little common sense in such things, her 
wifehood is a responsibility for which 
you are responsible, and which cannot 
be wholly nullified without humiliating 
her. 

Stop short of denying her the possession 
of some pocket-money of her own, if 
but very little. " During my married 
life," said a prominent lecturer on 
woman's rights, " I never had a cent of 
pocket-money that I was not forced to 
steal from my husband." And this 



76 /// the Domestic Relations, 

statement will evoke more reflection 
than censure in the thoughtful mind. 
Stop before grumblingly supplying the 

household demands. This practice of 
growling over a domestic expenditure, 
which is but a tithe of what your next 
"good time with the boys" will cost 
you, is more prevalent than sensible. 

Stop before placing any one over your 
wife's head in her own house. Be it 
mother-in-law, sister-in-law, or any one 
else, the course is alike risky and un- 
wise. 

Stop before cultivating a dislike or nig- 
gardliness for your wife's passion for 
dress, if it is accompanied by a refined 
taste and an earnest desire to be within 
what you can afford. Fine feathers 
may not always make fine birds, but a 



In the Domestic Relations. 77 

naturally attractive woman is undenia- 
bly more lovable and attractive when 
tastefully attired than otherwise. 

Stop long before relinquishing, after mar- 
riage, the delicate little attentions and 
[ sacrifices that were so acceptable during 
your courtship. A lover-husband will 
make a sweetheart-wife, and for such 
the honey-moon need have no wane. 

Stop, however, dead short of uxoriousness 
to a degree that shall excite a smile or 
comment. The former is apt to be 
exasperating, and the latter of a nature 
the reverse of soothing to your amour 
propre. 

Stop before developing a womanish desire 
to interfere with domestic arrangements 
outside of your province. In other 
words, never be what your wife might 



70 In the Domestic Relations. 

call a " cock-biddy," and your cook "an 
intermiddling mon." 

Stop before developing a fault-finding 
disposition with the cooking or other 
accommodations, or first be sure that 
you are not more responsible for the 
faults than your wife. 

Stop short of concealing the fact from your 
wife, if she is falling unconsciously into 
slovenly and unkempt personal habits 
when only in your presence. Let her 
but comprehend that this is a wifely 
neglect that has driven many a husband 
into neater but unscrupulous feminine 
society, and speedy amendment must 
follow. 

Stop before holding your wife accountable 
for every little smile or frankness 
accorded to her antenuptial admirers. 



In the Domestic Relations. 79 

'Tis the watched fire that languishes ; 
and, should she meditate treason, she 
would not hint it by so much as a rush- 
light. 

Stop before letting her know it, if you 
find out that your marriage has been 
a mistake. Doubtless this will make 
itself felt, despite your utmost precau- 
tions, and her sufferings in making the 
sad discovery will then challenge your 
compunction, your pity and your re- 
doubled devotion, if you are a true 
man. 

Stop before laughing at piety in your wife, 
even if an infidel yourself. " Wise men 
like to have pious wives," says Emer- 
son, "and it is well for all concerned 
that it should be so." 

Stop before betraying your weaknesses to 



So /;/ the Domestic Relations. 

your children. Even a hypocritical as- 
sumption of a morality that you do not 
always practice is preferable to self-ex- 
posure in this regard. 

Stop before correcting them in the pre- 
sence of outsiders. The self-respect of 
a little child, once wounded to the 
quick, is long in healing ; and some 
consideration is due, moreover, to the 
outsiders. 

Stop before punishing a child when in- 
fluenced by anger. The punishment 
then ceases to be corrective, and is only 
resentful ; whereas the helplessness of 
the child should of itself evoke but 
magnanimity. 

Stop, when thus impelled by anger, and 
reflect if you would as readily seek to 
gratify it, were no such disparity exist. 



In the Domestic Relations. 81 

ent — that is, where the child as big and 
powerful as yourself. 

Stop before threatening a chastisement 
that you don't intend to inflict Or, if 
you must persist in this course, don't 
ascribe the continued disobedience, 
which is its inevitable outgrowth, to 
anything but you own weakness. 

Stop short of deception or untruth in your 
dealings with your children, if you 
would impress them with the opposite 
sentiments. 

Stop, in this regard, and reflect that, if the 
childish mind is wax to early impress- 
ions, it is of a kind that hardens with 
the imprint, and that from the harden- 
ing process spring the imitation and 
the emulation, which must gradually 
corrupt or ennoble, as the case may be. 



82 In the Domestic Relations. 

Stop before assuming a bullying tone or 
attitude toward your family or your do- 
mestics. Vaporings of this description 
are always in wretched taste, and a 
home-circle that must needs be terror- 
ized is little to be envied. 

Stop before living beyond, or even quite 
up to your means, and be not ambitious 
to make an outside show at the expense 
of internal comfort. 

Stop short of lessening the significance of 
old-time festivities, such as Thanksgiv- 
ing Day, Christmas, New Years and 
birth-day observances, simply because 
you have yourself outgrown their zest. 

Stop before repressing any innocent pro- 
pensity to gush on the part of your wife 
or children. It is a chill home-fount- 
ain that will not occasionally overflow. 



In the Domestic Relatione. 83 

Stop, if possible, before ever disturbing 
your family peace with even so much as 
an unkind or hasty word. The pretty 
lines, 

" We have greeting words for the stranger, 
And smiles for the sometime guest, 
But oft for Our Own the bitter tone. 
Though we love Our Own the best," 

should never be pertinent in a wise 
man's household. 
Stop before assuming an oracular or in- 
fallible attitude — in other words, set- 
ting yourself up as a small god — before 
your own family. Ten to one, it is an 
assumption that you cannot maintain 
with any degree of consistency, and one 
which may entail a humiliating back- 
down when least expected. 



In Business Life. 

Stop short of attempting a business en- 
terprise wholly beyond your mental and 
financial equipment. To attempt the 
role of a railroad magnate, for instance, 
when you have the soul of a licensed 
fish-vender, or the manipulation of a 
government loan with hardly enough 
capital for a fruit-stand, would be more 
ambitious than wise. 

Stop before adopting rigorous and un- 
bending methods that, under a change 
of fortune, can be quoted against you 
to your disadvantage. Thus, to never 
lend money, on principle, when prosper- 
ous, but be perfectly willing to borrow 



In Bttsiness Life. 85 

it when broke, might subject you to un- 
pleasant comment. 

Stop before assuming a domineering, 
Jovian tone toward those with less 
money than you, even if you have a cor- 
ner on the market. Men are often like 
rats in this, that they fight when they 
are cornered. 

Stop when already so deep into a hope- 
less speculation that you can't beg or 
borrow another cent, when certain ruin 
stares you in the face, and even your 
pawn-tickets are at a discount. Folorn 
hopes are only practicable in serial 
stories and war. 

Stop, even at the height of prosperity, 
and make sure of the future by settling 
upon your family a competence that 
shall thenceforth forever be secured to 



86 In Business Life. 

them, come what may. This prudent 
course, feasible and honorable during 
prosperity, would be just the reverse if 
deferred until after business disaster 
may have come. 

Stop short of imagining that there is 
any more luck in a legitimate business 
than in games of chance — in other 
words, that there is any at all. Or, if 
there is any, it consists of superior 
energy, foresight, shrewdness and ap- 
plication, wherein, of course, the stron- 
ger wins while the weaker goes to the 
wall. 

Stop, and reflect well, before venturing 
outside of a legitimate, fairly-paying 
business upon the sea of speculation, 
which is in reality but gambling under 
another name. 



In Business Life. 87 

Stop before cultivating a reputation for 
either over-credulity or relentless hard 
bargaining in business life. The one 
will be abused, while the other will 
foster enmities through the abuse it 
practices. 

Stop short of uncompromising mar- 
tinetism toward your employees, Our 
clerks, for instance, can no longer be 
treated as apprentices ; many of them 
are rich men in embryo ; and with 
what satisfaction and gratitude do 
powerful millionaires often recall slight 
kindnesses and encouragements re- 
ceived from their employers when they 
were nothing but obscure clerks or 
office-boys ! 

Stop before choosing business quarters of 
a magnitude and pretension wholly out 



In Business Life. 

of keeping with your trade and custom. 
There is a laughable case in point., in 
the upper part of New York, where a 
diminutive, tumble-down junk-shop dis- 
plays a flaring sign with the preposter- 
ous legend : " Great American Mam- 
moth Junk Emporium." 

Stop before advertising your commodities 
for something better than they really 
are. This is to cheat yourself in the 
long run, for the average of public 
buyers rarely allow themselves to be 
deliberately swindled twice by the same 
liar. 

Stop short of supposing that the hack- 
neyed phrase, " Business is business," 
can ever excuse a downright dishonest 
transaction in the opinion of all your 
business acquaintances. 



In Business Life. 89 

Stop, therefore, before setting the ma- 
jority of them down as secretly unprin- 
cipled, and vaunting their uprightness 
as a mask. Money-loving as they are, 
the majority of those whose good 
opinion is worth having are personally 
honest at the core. 

Stop short of being dazzled by mere busi- 
ness success, irrespective of questionable 
or dangerous methods by which it may 
have been achieved. Unless the means 
shall have justified the result, there can 
be no praiseworthy success. 

Stop short of supposing that spasmodic 
cleverness can ever take the place of 
solid method, organized effort and set- 
tled application in any respectable 
calling. 

Stop, and go easy before provoking a 



90 In Business Life. 

powerful business hostility, if possible, 
but never to the sacrifice of a true prin- 
ciple ; and, war being fully declared | 
competition, ruthless and uncompro- 
mising), let it be to the knife, to the 
bitter end, till the last pecuniary sinew 
snaps ! 




In Thought, Word and 
Deed. 

Stop before even thinking unworthily. 
Not to entertain in the mind what you 
would blush to speak or put in writ- 
ing is an excellent general rule of 
ethics. 

Stop before nourishing a pride of nation- 
ality. This is even more unreasonable 
than the pride of ancestry, for the great- 
ness of the latter may be in some degree 
inherited, while for the mere accident 
of birth-place a man is as irresponsible 
as he is unentitled to plume himself 



92 In Thought^ Word end Deed. 

upon historical greatness in the ab- 
stract. 

Stoj), also, before cherishing even a pride 
of race. This is wholly distinct from 
the virtue of Patriotism, in its best 
sense ; is opposed to the enlightened 
spirit of the age ; and is one of the nar- 
rowest of prejudices. 

Stop short of despising public spirit in 
others, or eliminating it from your own 
calculations. The most insignificant 
pot-house politician is of more worldly 
use than the most gifted misanthrope. 
No amount of selfish seclusion or isola- 
tion can absolve one from his duty of 
fellowship. 

Stop before making butts of others, 
especially by reason of personal pecu- 
liarities for which they are in no wise 



In Thought, Word and Deed. 93 

responsible. The old aphorism about 
stone-throwing in relation to glass dom- 
iciles is always in order ; and even a 
natural-born fool is more to be pitied 
than ridiculed. 

Stop putting in words that which you 
would not do, or putting in writing that 
which you would not sign. 

Stop, and remember that an ill-considered 
angry word may, on the breath of hear- 
say, become a winged seed, from which 
shall spring a poisonous upas growth, 
whose deadly influence could not have 
been dreamed of at its inception. 

Stop before falling into apathy, before be- 
coming a do-nothing, through discour- 
agements. " A great mind," says Lacon, 
I- may change its objects, but it cannot 
relinquish them; it must have some- 



94 If* Thought, Word and Deed. 

thing to pursue. Variety is its relaxa- 
tion, and amusement its repose." 

Stop short of being painstaking to excess 
in what you would pass off as impro- 
vised. Over-elaboration in this regard 
may be likened to the dishabille in 
which a coquette would wish you to 
think you have surprised her, after 
spending hours at her toilet. 

Stop short of supposing that rascality can 
be as uniformly logical as honest)'. 
Villains are usually the worst casuists, 
and rush into greater crimes to avoid 
less. 

Stop, in combating the World, and reflect 
that by resisting its temptations you 
master the secret of ultimately possess- 
ing its noblest prizes, the respect of 
your fellows, and the proudest self- 



In Thought, Word and Deed. 95 

respect in having successfully withstood 
not in order to achieve, but from a 
sense of moral duty. 

Stop, in resisting the allurements of the 
Flesh, and consider that by subjecting 
them to the yoke of reason, your ca- 
pacity for rational fleshly enjoyment is 
both intensified and prolonged. 

Stop, in fighting the Devil (z. e. } moral 
perverseness,) and remember that your 
victory will be evidence of moral bal- 
ance on your own part, rather than of 
faint-heartedness on His Inky Majesty's. 
And you may likewise recall with com- 
placency Emerson's indictment, where 
he says, " It stands to reason that the 
Devil is an ass." 

Stop, after having fairly floored the Mac- 
hiavelian triumvirate, the World, the 



y6 I)i Thought, Word and Deed. 

Flesh and the Devil, and candidly con- 
fess that you might have fared worse 
but for the precepts and injunctions 
laid down in this little book. 



THE END. 



A GREAT HIT. 



A Naughty Girls Diary 




BY 



AUTHOR OF 



A Bad Boy's Diary. 



» 



FULL OF FUN. 



Stop! 

A Handy Monitor and 
Pocket Conscience. 



THE NEW'COLTON'S LACON." 



By Author of NEVER and ALWAYS. 



' ) 




~$ 



■> 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



022 009 226 4 



